Temporary sign bylaw to be revisted

Thursday

May 31, 2007 at 12:01 AMMay 31, 2007 at 6:05 PM

Steven Ryan

“I want a bylaw regulation policy that is as shrewd as possible,” Selectman Jim Healy said at the Board of Selectmen meeting on Tuesday, May 22. “I want to preserve the quality and character of this town as it’s been for hundreds of years.”

The selectmen discussed the issue at the Tuesday meeting in response to citizens’ complaints about the proliferation of signs, and recommended the formation of a committee to look at the issue more closely.

The April election brought the issue to a head, according to Selectman John Bulian.

“Needham has a short history of campaign signs,” Bulian said.

Selectman Jerry Wasserman said politicians stayed away from campaign signs for many years, assuming the public wouldn’t accept them — especially after a law was instituted by Town Meeting in the early 1980s prohibiting lawn signs. The law was eventually overturned.

“Over time the signs popped up from outside people running for office, like county offices and state Senate,” Wasserman said. “From there, it grew.”

Current town bylaws dictate political signs must be taken down within a month of the election, and the placement of signs on private property needs the approval of the property owner.

But the enforcement of the bylaws is another issue. The time restrictions on political and event signs are difficult to enforce since it is often impossible to determine when the signs were placed.

It also can be cumbersome to devote town resources to removing commercial signs, which often seem to multiply like rabbits.

“Companies, like dating services, are putting signs on public land,” said Wasserman, who added that commercial signs have been a recent phenomenon. “That is illegal.”

Police have enforced town bylaws on commercial signage simply by approaching people, while they’re putting up the signs, and reminding them of the law. That was the case in March, when police approached folks placing signs for Needham Singles into snow banks on Highland Avenue and asked them to take the signs down.

“I don’t know if anything else is realistic,” Wasserman said.

As for responding to complaints about political signs, the selectmen were concerned about making laws that don’t infringe on free speech, accounting for the possibility that some complaints could be politically motivated, with supporters of one campaign complaining about signs from the opposing camp.

“To set policy on political signs, it has to be fair,” Bulian said. “It is a balance between free speech and the ability to define use on public property.”

The law passed in the 1980s prohibited political lawn signs and commercial signs.

“The concern at the time wasn’t political signs as much as the perceived proliferation of strip-mall type commercial signage in town and a desire to improve Needham’s general aesthetics,” Selectman Dan Matthews said.

The law, as it pertained to political signs, was rewritten in 1986 – allowing for political signs on private property with restrictions on size and how long they stayed up – after Matthews initiated litigation that made its way to the U.S. Court of Appeals.

When John Kerry ran for lieutenant governor, Matthews allowed his home to be used as campaign headquarters and put up a sign in support of Kerry, for which he was given a citation. Matthews went to Town Meeting to change the law, but was unable to convince officials to lift the ban and eventually took the town to court. The courts ruled in his favor, forcing the town to lift the absolute ban.

“The federal court found the bylaw unconstitutional,” Matthews said.

At Tuesday’s meeting, Town Manager Kate Fitzpatrick promised to look into the issue further and report back to the selectmen, possibly taking up the selectmen’s recommendation to form a committee to examine sign bylaws. Healy asked that any refined bylaws to be clear and well publicized.